The Life of the Mind
by Lady Jekyll
Summary: [Barton Fink] What if the Hotel Earle was something far worse than Hell? What could possibly be worse than eternal damnation? Barton Fink is about to find out. Rating has gone up for violence.  Chapters 4 and five are up.  COMPLETE!
1. Inferno

The Life of the Mind

Ch. 1: Inferno

* * *

Summery: What if the Hotel Earle was something far worse than Hell? What could possibly be worse than eternal damnation? Barton Fink is about to find out.

* * *

A/n: I do not own the Coen Brothers' creations. If I did, I'd be one heck of a happy woman…and Steve Buscemi wouldn't die so often. Poor Steve…. I love you… This takes place during the movie.

* * *

Barton looked around himself, dazed. The Hotel Earle, the building he'd called home for the past few weeks, was aflame. Fink watched the flames lick the center of the hallway walls. Why wouldn't it spread? What the hell was happening here? Barton, mesmerized, reached out a hand and allowed the flames to touch his exposed flesh. He could feel the heat of the fire and was waiting for a scream to escape his lips…

But there was no scream. There was no _pain_. Barton withdrew his hand and held it in front of his eyes. The flames did not ignite his hand. His flesh was unscathed, not even the hairs on the back of his hand had been singed. Something was very, _very_ wrong. Fink looked up at the sound of heavy footsteps.

"Howdy, Bart," said Karl "Madman" Mundt, alias Charlie Meadows. "Leavin' so soon, huh?"

Barton opened his mouth, but he could not speak. His confusion would gain no voice. It was beyond verbal comprehension. Charlie grinned, clutching a sawed-off shotgun in the crook of one arm. He was grabbing on to something with his other hand.

"Hey, watch this," he told Fink. Charlie shoved a young man forward. The man stumbled back two or three steps. Barton recognized him. It was Chet, the desk clerk. Fink stood, unable to move. His body and mind were to separate halves now and his mind was safe and far, far away. Charlie grinned like a kid in a candy store, aiming the gun point-blank at Chet's heart. Barton, still unable to speak, began mentally screaming at the bellhop.

_Run! **Run**! Dammit, he's gonna—_

Chet flashed a weak, almost morose grin at Barton, as though he had heard his thoughts. The bellhop sighed audibly, shut his eyes and extended his arms, waiting. Charlie's grin turned darkly sinister. Barton screamed internally as Meadows pulled the trigger. The bullet ripped through the bellhop's chest. Chet staggered back a bit, shards of bone from his rib cage protruding through both the front and back of his uniform. Fink stared in horror as he saw that Chet's heart was still beating, unfazed and exposed from within the gaping hole in his chest.

"Get back to work, you miserable little worm," Charlie ordered.

"L—leave him alone!" said Barton. Meadows threw an ugly look at the playwright. Chet looked both surprised and amused.

"What's he to you, Barton?" Charlie inquired. "Did you two have a late-night liaison I'm not aware of?"

Fink swallowed the urge to scream. He took a deep breath and looked at Chet.

"I need to check out," he said. Chet smiled menacingly. His teeth were filed to sharp cannibal points.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Fink," he said. He grabbed Barton's arms and held them behind his back. Charlie aimed the gun once more. This time is was at Barton. "I can't let you do that."

Fink tried to free himself, but the bellhop's grip was like steel. He turned slightly, looking Chet in the face. Chet's eyes had turned from blue to black with no whites, pupils or irises visible; it was only darkness.

"This isn't real!" Barton cried, struggling against this demon in a bellhop's uniform. "C'mon, Barton, _wake up_!"

"Ha! This is real, Barton!" crowed Charlie.

Barton shook his head. He wouldn't believe it. He _couldn't_ believe it. It just didn't make any sense!

"No! No! This isn't real! _None of this is real_!" Fink screamed. Charlie sighed as Chet forced Barton to his knees. Meadows then positioned the barrel of the shotgun under Barton's jaw. The playwright felt himself lose control of his hand as his finger found the trigger. "Please, no!" Barton pleaded, tears welling in his eyes. "Please don't kill me. How have I harmed you? Either of you?"

Charlie laughed. He loved it when people pleaded with him. It was highly entertaining.

"If you pull that trigger, everything will be fine. You'll wake up and all of this will be gone," he said. He smiled as Barton shut his eyes, fingering the trigger. "You can trust me, Barton. I'm your friend, right?"

_"Please—no!"_

BLAM!

A gunshot exploded through the 6th floor of the Hotel Earle. The hellfire that flowed like waves against the center of the hallway walls were extinguished as if by magic, leaving no trace of themselves behind. Charlie Meadows sighed.

"I'm turnin' in. G'night Chet."

Chet nodded. The gaping hole in his chest had disappeared, once again replaced by the diamond-shaped emblem baring the words _Hotel Earle_. His teeth had lost their demonic appearance and his eyes were blue once more.

"G'night, Mr. Meadows," he said.


	2. Welcome Back

The Life of the Mind

Ch. 2: Welcome Back

* * *

A/n: Rating has gone up for violence…Steve Buscemi turned into demon…I don't know if that's a good thing...

* * *

Barton heard the explosion and waited for the stereotypical light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel experience. He knew that the right side of his jaw—or more probably, his face—was blown away. There was no light, and yet no fire and brimstone either. Nor any tunnel for that matter. Fink heard screaming; terrified, instill-the-fear-of-God-in-those-who-heard-it screaming. Was he dead? No, he couldn't be. _He was the one screaming_. One couldn't scream with the half of one's face blown apart, right? 

"_He's awake, Doctor,"_ said a faraway female voice. Barton's senses seemed to all be separate parts of his body. He knew he was screaming; he could feel his throat rupture and the screams turned to choking, even though his mind was far away. Fink felt himself spit out a mouthful of blood. His thoughts were slow, as if he'd just wakened from sleep.

_Doctor…? Where am I? How'd I get here?_

An intense-looking man, obviously the doctor by the looks of him, gave Barton a weak smile. Fink looked into the doctor's steely gray eyes, searching them for an answer he couldn't find.

"You're a very sick man, Mr. Fink," the doctor said quietly. He sighed and continued. "My name is Dr. Gressman. I'm here to help you."

_I'm not sick, what are you talking about?_

Barton felt a nauseating pang of dread as he looked at his surroundings. He was lying in a bed, leather belts lashed around his wrists, chest, knees and ankles. This was a hospital. Worse yet, it was an _insane asylum_. Fink tried to talk, but his voice was gone. The only sound to escape his lips was a gurgle of blood that issued from his ruptured throat.

"You were found in a condemned building, covered in the blood of two recent murder victims. Both bodies were with you," Gressman explained. Barton, mute, shut his eyes, tears falling down his face.

_Audrey, Mayhew…God in heaven, it wasn't a dream. They really **are** dead!_

"What were you doing in that building, Mr. Fink?" the doctor inquired. "Why did you kill those people?"

_It wasn't me!_ Barton raged mentally. _It was Charlie Meadows! Madman Mundt! For the love of God, ya gotta believe me!_ _I don't belong here! I'm just a tourist with a typewriter; I never harmed anybody!_

Barton jerked his head to the right, looking past Gressman's shoulder and over at the man who had just been dragged into the room, secured to a bed (just as Barton had been) in the opposite corner of the room. The newcomer had blood-soaked bandages wrapped around his wrists and torso. Fink recognized him. It was Ben Geisler, the producer Barton had worked for when he first came to Hollywood. Ben had been fired due to the screenplay Fink had written and had tried to get Barton fired alongside him. It didn't work.

_Mr. Geisler! Thank God! You've gotta tell this man I'm no murderer! __**You know me! Please!**_

"Buh—Ben!" Barton choked. Dr. Gressman blinked, looking over his shoulder at Geisler's copiously bleeding (but very much alive) body on the other bed.

"You know this man, Mr. Fink?" he demanded, turning his attention back to Barton.

"I—I did—not—kill those—people," gurgled Fink in between mouthfuls of blood. "He'll tell—you. He'll tell—!" Barton stopped, choking again. He strained at his bonds, his back arching in pain from coughing. Fink wasn't sure what was worse—the Hotel Earle, or this place.

Gressman disappeared out the door to this cold prison-like hospital room. Barton and Geisler were alone. Or so Barton hoped. Fink looked around, trying to make sense of what was going on as he looked back at where Ben lay. The former producer was awake, his breathing rapid and shallow. Chet was sitting at his bedside.

"Who are you?" Geisler asked. Chet grinned, his eyes and teeth demonic once again. His heart was visibly beating from within his ruptured chest.

"I'm nothing," replied Chet. "My boss is the one you should worry about. You're a very egocentric man, Benjamin Geisler." He flashed a straight razor in front of Ben's face.

"Chet—NO!" Barton howled. "Enough blood—has been shed!"

Chet let out a frightening bray of hellish laughter.

"Why should I listen to you?" he asked. He jerked his head side to side, the vertebrae in his neck cracking audibly. "You don't own me."

"What—are you doing here?" Fink coughed, straining all the more at the belts around his wrists.

The bellhop from Hell stood up and took one step forward. Barton let out a shout. Chet now appeared right at him, clamping a pale, long-fingered hand across his bloody mouth.

"Welcoming you back to the land of the living, Mr. Fink. Thought I'd stick around, if that's all right with you," he said.

"O, ift ot aright wif be!" Barton raged; his voice muffled thanks to Chet's hand over his mouth. Chet released Fink from his grip, looking at the blood covering his own palm. His features turned wolfish as he licked the blood off his hand like an animal. He licked his lips when he had finished, chuckling.

"It always tastes so much better when you're scared," he said. "I can taste fear, you know. But with you, Mr. Fink, it's different. I taste confusion. You're probably wondering why you're here, right?"

"Go away!" Barton snarled. His mouth began to blister, as though Chet's touch had burned him. Chet angrily placed the blade of the straight razor against Fink's throat.

"I already told you! _You don't own me!_" He cracked his neck audibly again and continued. "Not anymore."


	3. Origins

The Life of the Mind

Ch. 3: Origins

* * *

A/n: Can you find the _Miller's Crossing_ reference?

* * *

"Wuh—what _are_ you?" Barton asked. Chet flashed a cannibalistic grin at him. He pulled a heavily singed but readable newspaper out of thin air in reply. The bellhop then placed the straight razor in his pocket, putting a hand to Barton's throat. Fink let out a cry of pain as his raw and bloody throat became cauterized from the inside.

"Feel better?" Chet inquired. His voice was satirically compassionate. He freed Barton from the leather straps binding him to the bed. Fink picked up the newspaper the demon bellhop had magically summoned. It was dated July 17, 1939.

_**Man Killed in Hotel Fire**_, the headline proclaimed. _A worker at the Hotel Earle met a grisly fate when he was trapped in the hotel's basement when the building mysteriously burst into flame. Chet LaRouie, 33, died when the upper floor collapsed on top of him while he was working…_

Barton looked at the article, gazing at the photograph of the charred remains of the Hotel Earle that was printed alongside the story.

"Hasn't the Earle been rebuilt?" he asked. "It's been almost two years."

"No," replied Chet, seemingly interested with the nails on his right hand. "You _thought _you were in a hotel, but it was really the charred remains."

"How does that explain Charlie? Audrey? Hell, even you?"

Chet's hellish eyes flickered slightly.

"Charlie…" he started. Barton was surprised to see that the demonic desk clerk looked afraid. "Charlie's a hard taskmaster. He's, well, the Devil in all honesty. I don't know jack about the dead girl."

"What was your death like?" Barton asked. "Do you remember it?"

The bellhop's eyes flickered from black to blue as he spoke.

"It's not exactly something you can forget," he said. "But yeah, I remember. I was down below, shining shoes when it happened. By the time I smelled the smoke it was too late. One of the rafters had fallen on the trap door. I couldn't get out. There was this crashing sound and before I knew it, I was buried alive."

"The paper said you died after the place caved in," rebuked Barton.

"It wasn't instantaneous," Chet snapped. "I died after—" he winced as though in pain and continued. "I died after my ribcage collapsed. It couldn't have been more than five or ten minutes."

"How does Charlie come inta all this?" Fink asked.

"God, SHUT UP!" Chet roared, burns and lacerations covering his face and hands. Barton could literally see the bellhop's heart beat increase. Chet turned his attention back to Ben Geisler.

"What the hell is going on?" Ben asked. He turned his head in Barton's direction. "Fink? What are you doin' here? You dead too?"

"You're not dead, Mr. Geisler," said Barton. Chet fought to hide a wolfish smile.

"Damn, I thought I was. The pain was so bad, I was sure I was gone," Ben muttered, straining at his bonds.

"You thought those cat-scratches were painful?" Chet asked quietly, pointing at the bandages around Geisler's slit wrists. "How 'bout this?" He snapped his fingers and Ben's body tensed in pain. Chet snapped his fingers over and over several times. Each time, Ben was subjugated to an increasingly higher level of physical pain.

"Chet, stop!" Barton said.

"NO MORE!" Ben screamed, his body writhing in agony. "PLEASE! NO MORE!"

"You want me to stop? All right, if you're sure…"

"YES!"

Chet snapped his fingers one last time. Ben's rib cage exploded, shards of bone jutting through the bandages wrapped around his torso. Barton was frozen in horror and splashed with blood. He felt his legs collapse under him and knew no more.


	4. Fissure

The Life of the Mind

Ch. 4: Fissure

* * *

A/n: Damn…major déjà vu…

* * *

_"Ah! God in Heaven! How did this happen?" _

Barton recognized the voice of Dr. Gressman. He groaned as his consciousness returned to him. Fink felt a pair of hands force him to his feet.

"How did you get _free_?" Gressman demanded, shaking Barton by the shoulders. "Lord God, you _killed_ a man!"

"Wasn't me…" Barton mumbled. "It wasn't me."

Gressman looked as though he was on the verge of throttling him. He jerked his head from side to side, his neck cracking just as Chet's had.

"I'm putting you in solitary confinement, Barton," he said in a voice of forced calm. "How the _hell_ did you do it? How could you mange to _rip open_ a man's chest with your _bare hands_?"

Barton swayed where he stood, gazing at his hands. He was drenched in blood from the neck down and there was blood and fragments of something under his fingernails. Fink realized with a stab of horror that is was human flesh. He fell to his knees and vomited.

"It—wasn't me," Barton protested only to be sick again.

"Then who was it, Mr. Fink?" Gressman inquired.

"Chet—" pause and retch. "Chet LaRouie."

Gressman sighed; he turned to a pair of men and gave a nod. The two men grabbed Barton, strapping the playwright into a straight jacket. Fink was then dragged out of the room and down the hall. Screams and howls emitted from row after row of locked steel doors.

_The Earle was nothing compared to this,_ thought Barton. _If this isn't Hell, I don't know what is._

Barton was roughly shoved into a padded room. He quickly lost his balance, as his arms were strapped to his chest because of the straight jacket. Fink sighed as he propped himself up in a corner of the room.

"What is happening to me?" he asked aloud.

"Haven't you figured it out?" asked his own voice. Barton looked around and saw his mirror image sitting leisurely in the left corner of the ceiling. This doppelganger Barton grinned at him, arms crossed lazily against his ribs. He wasn't wearing a straight jacket, but regular clothes.

"What is there to figure out?" the real Fink asked.

The 'Other' Barton took a pull on the cigarette between his teeth before speaking.

"You're a killer, Barton," he said, jumping down from the ceiling to the padded floor of the room below. "You killed Audrey and Mayhew. Don't you remember?"

"It wasn't me!" Barton griped. "It was Charlie! _I know it was_!"

"Charlie Meadows doesn't exist, don't you see?"

"No!" Barton raged. "Chet himself said that Charlie is the Devil!"

"And the greatest trick the Devil ever played was convincing man that he didn't exist," rebuked the 'Other' Fink lazily, taking another drag on his cigarette. "All men have a devilish part in them, Barton. Yours is just…stronger than most. So strong, in fact, that he became a separate person entirely…in your mind, anyway."

"SHUT UP!" Barton screamed. He didn't want to hear anymore. He wasn't crazy and he damn well knew it. Why couldn't anyone else see that? "Leave me alone!"

The 'Other' Barton disappeared from sight, but his voice was audible, echoing throughout the room.

"_You __**are**__ alone."_


	5. The Life of the Mind

The Life of the Mind

Ch. 5: The Life of the Mind

* * *

A/n: This is the last chapter!

* * *

Six months had passed since Barton Fink had been locked away. He'd been convicted, tried and found guilty of the murders of Audrey Taylor, W.P Mayhew and Benjamin Geisler, as well as the deaths of his own family back in New York. The insanity defense had failed and Barton had been sentenced to death.

"Come on, Mr. Fink," said Dr. Gressman quietly. "It's time to go."

Fink nodded solemnly. Before his trial, he'd protested his innocence, but no one listened. After the first few weeks of pleading his case, he stopped talking all together. He didn't care anymore. _Maybe_, he thought, _maybe I __**am**__ crazy…_

Barton couldn't recall the murders, but he couldn't help but wonder 'what if…?'. Perhaps he was a killer. It didn't really matter now, either way. He was damned as it was. Fink was silent as he walked up the narrow wooden steps to the gallows waiting for him. A large crowd of people had gathered to view the spectacle and Barton was unperturbed. An elderly man read aloud from a sheaf of papers in his hands.

"Barton Fink, you have been found guilty of a series of heinous murders. The state of California has ordered that you are to be hung by the neck until dead. May God have mercy on your soul."

Barton sighed, wincing at the tightness of the noose around his neck.

"Any last words?" asked the hangman in a gruff voice.

Fink was silent. The hangman stood a foot away from him, his hand on the handle to the trapdoor beneath Barton's feet.

"You know," the executioner went on. "This reminds me of my death."

Barton turned in horror and saw Chet LaRouie standing in the hangman's place. The demon grinned, showing off his pointed teeth.

"G'bye, Mr. Fink."

"Chet—!" Barton cried.

The trapdoor fell and Fink fell into a permanent silence.


End file.
